An OSHA competent person is, by definition, “one who is capable of identifying existing and predictable hazards in the surroundings or working conditions which are unsanitary, hazardous, or dangerous to employees, and who has authorization to take prompt corrective measures to eliminate them” — 29 CFR 1926.32(f). Two parts, and employers routinely miss the second one.
The two-part test
Capability means demonstrable knowledge of the specific hazard — soil mechanics for excavations, scaffold components and load paths, fall protection systems. Training builds it; experience seasons it; documentation proves it.
Authority means the person can stop work, order the trench shored, or pull crews off a scaffold without asking permission first. A superbly trained foreman who must call the office before halting work is not a competent person — and inspectors test for exactly this. The designation lives or dies on what happens when production pressure meets a hazard.
Where does OSHA require a competent person?
The term appears throughout the construction standards, but these are the designations that generate citations when they’re missing:
- Excavation and trenching — 29 CFR 1926 Subpart P requires a competent person to classify soil, select protective systems, and inspect excavations before each shift and after every rain or vibration event. See excavation competent person training.
- Scaffolds — Subpart L requires erection, movement, and dismantling under a competent person’s supervision, plus pre-shift inspections.
- Fall protection — Subpart M assigns the competent person everything from equipment inspection to monitoring duties in specific systems.
- Respirable crystalline silica — 1926.1153 requires a designated competent person to implement the written exposure control plan.
- Rigging and material handling — 1926.251 puts sling and hardware inspection under competent-person eyes.
General industry uses the concept too (cranes, some fall protection provisions), but construction is where the designation is most explicit — and most enforced.
Competent person vs. qualified person
OSHA distinguishes them deliberately. A qualified person (1926.32(m)) has a degree, certificate, or extensive knowledge enabling them to solve problems — the engineer who designs the shoring system. The competent person identifies hazards and acts — the one who inspects that shoring every morning and clears the trench when the walls weep. Some standards require both, and one individual can hold both roles only if they genuinely meet both definitions.
How employers get designation wrong
The failure patterns are consistent: designating someone by memo without training them; training someone without granting stop-work authority; designating one competent person for a hazard they know and three they don’t; and having no documentation when an inspector asks “who is your competent person for this excavation, and how do they know what they know?” An answer that takes more than ten seconds is usually the start of a citation — and if one has already landed, here’s what to do after an OSHA citation.
Getting it right
Designation is cheap; competence is built. Formal, hazard-specific training with documented evaluation, written designation that grants explicit authority, and refreshers when conditions or standards change. PS&M runs competent person courses for excavation, scaffold, fall protection, silica, and rigging — on your site, on your equipment.
And when a project needs the role filled today, an embedded on-site safety professional arrives already trained, credentialed, and authorized. Tell us what the project needs.
Written by Joe Henricks, Founder & Principal Consultant at Professional Safety & Management — BCSP, NASP, and ASSP affiliated, with decades of field experience across construction and general industry.